{"id":8063,"date":"2019-07-11T08:03:03","date_gmt":"2019-07-11T12:03:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8063"},"modified":"2019-07-11T08:03:03","modified_gmt":"2019-07-11T12:03:03","slug":"navigating-oceans-of-words","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8063","title":{"rendered":"Navigating Oceans of Words"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

From time to time, my writing group has included a member\nwhose first language is other than English. It\u2019s only when you tackle editing\nthe prose of such an individual that you begin to appreciate what an unwieldy\nbeast American English is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A stunning recent reminder of this came in Reuben\nWestmaas<\/a>\u2019s essay on word order. It turns out that English has a very\nprecise requirements for stringing along adjectives. Who knew? I didn\u2019t. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is Westmaas quoting Mark Forsyth: \u201cAdjectives\nabsolutely have to be in this order: opinion-size-age-shape-color-origin-material-purpose\nNoun. [Really?<\/em>] So you can have a\nlovely little old rectangular green French silver whittling knife. But if you\nmess with that order in the slightest you’ll sound like a maniac.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s mind-bogglingly true. Try rearranging this example: \u201cI\njust bought nice new wine refrigerator\u201d (opinion-age-purpose-Noun) These\ninsights, which most of us have internalized since \u201cSee Spot chase the big red\nball\u201d (size-color-Noun) and not thought of again\u2014not even thought of as\nreflecting a thing<\/em>, like a rule–are\nfrom Mark Forsyth\u2019s 2013 book, The\nElements of Eloquence<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m sure glad that decades of reading and listening have\nimprinted that rule in my brain so that I don\u2019t have to actually think about\nit. I\u2019ve also abandoned any thought of teaching ESL.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A second problem is our language is jam-packed with idioms. To\na German-born friend, I suggested a book I was currently in love with\u2014The<\/em> Big\nSky<\/em>, one of Pulitzer-winner A B Guthrie. Jr.\u2019s six monumental novels about\nthe Oregon Trail and the development of Montana. To me, it was a perfect\nevocation of the American sense of the limitless possibilities of \u201cgoing West\u201d\n(alas, fading now), of being independent and free, of the frontier. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I foolishly didn\u2019t recognize that the idioms were thick as\nthe forests, and not just modern (for 1947) idioms. It employed colorful uses\nof language that would make sense to an 1830 fur trapper and his backwoods brethren\nrafting on the Missouri River. And here I thought the language was absurdly simple.\nWe won\u2019t mention their grammar: \u201cAin\u2019t nothin like whiskey to ile (oil) a rusty\ntongue.\u201d He gave the book back to me in complete bafflement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A final problem is spelling, given that dozens of languages form\nour crazy talk, and the \u201crules\u201d created to pretend it makes sense, which are\nrife with exceptions. Relatedly, I\u2019d include that bane of the self-published\nand indifferently edited: homophones (led, lead; bough, bow; pique, peak;\ngreat, grate; and so on and on and on). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We all remember the spelling rule \u201ci before e except after c\nand in words that have the \u2018a\u2019 sound.\u201d Sure. Westmaas points out that more\nAmerican words violate that principle than follow it. In fact, the score is 900\nto 40 in favor of \u201cexceptions.\u201d I\u2019ll take his word for it. How I became a\nschool spelling bee champion is one of life\u2019s mysteries. \n\nWe writers sail on, navigating our little boats through\na sea of linguistic confusion. We may take the peculiarities of English for\ngranted, but when we\u2019re faced with a non-native\u2019s prose, wow. There be dragons.\nGive those adventurers credit!\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Photo: Steve Johnson, creative commons license.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From time to time, my writing group has included a member whose first language is other than English. It\u2019s only when you tackle editing the prose of such an individual that you begin to appreciate what an unwieldy beast American … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8064,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Navigating Oceans of Words - difficulties facing writers whose first language isn't English (i.e., the rules we take for granted and their exceptions!)","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[174,185,51,29],"tags":[1600],"class_list":["post-8063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-first-draft-blog","category-language","category-words","category-writing","tag-mark-forsyth"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/magnetic-poetry.jpg?fit=260%2C194&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-263","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8063"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8063\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11391,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8063\/revisions\/11391"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}